Ilia Topuria is sharing an update on his fighting future, and while things remain cloudy for the two division champion, \u201cEl Matador\u201d remains confident that big things are coming.<\/p>\n
Topuria recently spoke with Diario AS after being appointed an ambassador against drugs and bullying by the Spanish government, and he admitted he still doesn\u2019t know for sure when he\u2019ll fight next or against who.<\/p>\n
\u201cThere\u2019s really nothing official so far,\u201d Topuria said. \u201cI have not had any official conversations with them either. These are all rumors so far. As soon as we get a call and go into details I\u2019ll be able to tell you more, but so far it\u2019s all just rumors.\u201d<\/p>\n
The reports we\u2019re hearing have Topuria returning<\/a> for the first premium event on Paramount+ in January against Justin Gaethje or Paddy Pimblett.<\/p>\n \u201cWhich one do I prefer? If it\u2019s my choice, I think I\u2019d rather fight against Paddy,\u201d Topuria said. \u201cBecause there\u2019s a history that unites us and I think it\u2019s going to be a much more entertaining fight for the public and at the end of the day I compete to entertain everyone and for them to have a truly unique experience. And I think with Paddy we could achieve that.\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cRegardless of what I want, the final decision, the final say comes from the UFC.\u201d<\/p>\n He\u2019s still interested in chasing down<\/a> former lightweight champion Islam Makhachev should the Dagestani fighter beat Jack Della Maddalena at UFC 322 in November.<\/p>\n \u201cI think my goal would be to move up to the next weight class and fight for a third belt if I were given the opportunity,\u201d he said. \u201cBut with the UFC, in the end, you never know, because you may have your interests but at the end of the day the company has its own. So let\u2019s see how the stars align and what the future has in store for us. Without a doubt, what interests me most is making fights bigger and bigger so I can entertain the entire audience.\u201d<\/p>\n The other immediate goal for Topuria is a massive fight in Spain, hopefully at Real Madrid\u2019s home of Santiago Bernabeu Stadium.<\/a> The venue can hold a whopping 85,000 people and would be the biggest UFC event in European history, but the UFC has been slow to put things together. But Topuria remains optimistic that it will happen.<\/p>\n \u201cThe topic is much more advanced than people might imagine,\u201d he said of UFC Spain. \u201cSome much firmer steps are already being taken than those taken last year because there were things that hindered that communication due to the commercial agreement they had for television rights.\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cSo things are looking better and better, at some point it will happen. I would love to be able to tell you the exact year and date and who it would be against. Unfortunately I don\u2019t have it, but hey, you can always push for it.\u201d<\/p>\n Topuria is referring to the specifics of UFC\u2019s deal with ESPN, which pushed the promotion to hold all its numbered events in primetime in the United States. That led to insanely late start times for Europe, like when Tom Aspinall fought at 4 a.m.<\/a> in Manchester for UFC 304. Topuria has said that kind of situation was a non-starter,<\/a> and UFC CEO Dana White has hinted it wouldn\u2019t be required under the Paramount+ deal starting in 2026.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Ilia Topuria is sharing an update on his fighting future, and while things remain cloudy for the two…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":237385,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[570],"tags":[64,63,786,785,85,1396],"class_list":{"0":"post-237384","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-mma","8":"tag-au","9":"tag-australia","10":"tag-fighting","11":"tag-mma","12":"tag-sports","13":"tag-ufc-news"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/237384","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=237384"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/237384\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/237385"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=237384"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=237384"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=237384"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}